Significance and prospect of workers health center

ABSTRACT

Systematic health management is crucial in small-sized enterprises since the number of enterprises and their employees make up a large proportion of all businesses and they account for the majority of industrial accidents and occupational illnesses. The Korean government had operated the Banwol-Sihwa Regional Center for Occupational Health to provide occupational health services and chronic disease management to the workers in small-sized enterprises as a pilot health promotion project from 2007 to 2010. Since then, Gyeonggi-seobu workers health center (WHC) was established in 2011 to provide physician care for small-sized enterprises through the Industrial Accident Compensation Fund. The WHC has provided basic occupational health services including health promotion activities to prevent work-related diseases. Core strategies of the WHC were networking with regional health resources, post-examination care for workers with abnormal findings in health screenings, the operation of branch offices for better accessibility, and services for vulnerable workers including immigrant, women, and elderly workers. An evaluation of WHCs conducted in 2012 showed excellent performance in terms of cost-effectiveness, high satisfaction, and intent toward continuous use among visitors. For the advancement of WHCs, visiting services to the worksites have to be integrated adequately with services in WHCs, and more subsidiary centers need to be established for better accessibility. Moreover, the expansion of the service items and development of specialized health programs are needed. Measures should be considered to systematically collect health data and identify workplace risk factors to improve the quality of post-examination care.